


Corrigendum

by phonecallfromgod



Category: Newsies - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, F/M, M/M, Multi, POV Outsider, Rom-Com Style Misunderstanding
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-04
Updated: 2020-06-04
Packaged: 2021-03-03 20:42:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,113
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24501796
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/phonecallfromgod/pseuds/phonecallfromgod
Summary: Corrigendum- An error, usually a printer's error, discovered too late to be corrected in a document and included in a separately printed list. Also called addendum.It's not that Jack isn't paying attention to all the interpersonal drama at the paper, it's just that knowing and understanding aren't always the same thing.
Relationships: Crutchie/Jack Kelly, David Jacobs/Katherine Plumber Pulitzer, Spot Conlon/Racetrack Higgins
Comments: 8
Kudos: 31





	Corrigendum

Katherine and Davey are already in the midst of what is shaping up to be yet another all night standoff, so it’s a nice reprieve for Jack when Crutchie shows up at 11:30 pm with the edited events calendar from the student union. 

“Am I the fucking best or am I the fucking best?” Crutchie asks, leaning his wrist crutches up against Jack’s desk so he can rummage around in his backpack, extracting a Jimmy Johns bag which he unceremoniously chucks in front of Jack. 

“Oh!” Jack exclaims, leaning forward and pulling his legs down from where he’d had them kicked up on the desk. “You’re a fucking angel. What do I owe you?” 

Crutchie shrugs. “Eh, I had to go right by there anyways, you can just pay me back with you undying love and gratitude.” 

“Always,” Jack says, mouth already full of Spicy Italian #7.

“That’s disgusting,” Davey says, back turned away from Jack at their neighbouring desks, not even looking up from where he’s marking up a page with green pen. 

“And delicious,” Jack says, chewing extra loudly for effect, which is short lived when Davey throws an eraser over his shoulder at him, hitting him in the jaw. “Ow Dave! Freedom of the press.” 

“Hey, I got your stuff,” Crutchie says, pulling two bottles of Pepsi Max out of his bag and tossing them underhanded at Davey, who has deigned to finally turn around in his chair. 

“Bless,” Davey says, pulling out his wallet and fishing out a five dollar bill. 

“Nah, it’s chill.” 

“Take it.” 

“Well alright don’t have to twist my arm about it.” 

“Though, hey, on second thought I dunno, maybe you don’t wanna take that. It could be dirty money,” Davey says as Crutchie shoves the five in his wallet.

“Oh my god,” Katherine says from the other side of the office. “I didn’t say that. Stop misrepresenting my point!” 

“What’s it tonight?” Crutchie says knowingly. 

“So remember when I sweet talked all those moms into buying ad space in the paper?” 

“Yeah, all the pyramid scheme ones?” 

“Yes, pyramid schemes, exactly. Thank you,” Katherine says, chair screeching as she gets up from her desk. 

Jack really should leave well enough alone but riling Katherine and Davey up is basically free background entertainment. “I thought they were calling ‘em, uh, ‘multi-level marketing schemes’ now.” 

“Oh please,” Katherine snorts. “You can call it whatever you like, that doesn’t change what it is.” 

“I’m sorry,” Crutchie says, adjusting his wrist crutches. “And what exactly is so evil about bored housewives selling stuff?” 

“They’re exploitative! Something like 98% of people who buy into these companies as ‘distributors’ end up losing money,” Katherine says. “They’re predatory and that’s not the kind of business we, as a reputable news publication, should be giving a platform to for the sake of a few fifty-dollar ad slots.” 

“Have you personally investigated the business practices of every single advertiser we’ve accepted? I mean hey, we all know minimum wage isn’t enough to afford a one bedroom in this state, isn’t that pretty exploitative?” Katherine huffs as Davey continues. “No look, objectively they’re super shady, but we can’t just arbitrarily draw the line on this one thing when, hello, capitalism is already exploitative by its very nature.” 

“Plus,” Davey says, opening one of his drinks. “What broke college student is going to splurge on some non-FDA approved essential oils or wax melts? Literally the only person I know who even owns that stuff is you.” 

“I _told_ you,” Katherine snaps. “My mom keeps buying that stuff and giving it to me! I’m not responsible.” 

“Mhmm.” 

“You are so insufferable sometimes David,” Katherine says turning on her heel and stalking off in the other direction. “Also all the aspartame in that shit is going to give you brain tumors.” 

“Those studies were inconclusive,” Davey says taking a passive aggresive sip of his Pepsi and turning back to his own desk. 

Jack picks his sandwich back up. “And that’s what you missed on Glee.” 

“What’d Denton say?” Crutchie asks. 

“He let them fight it out for about ten minutes and then he announced he was going to take a power nap, about, uh, two hours ago. So I’m just sitting on my ass til he gets up and makes a decision.”

“Lucky you,” Crutchie says. 

Jack clears out a space and pats the top of his desk. “You should chill for a while! It’ll be just like good old times before you abandoned us to write dining hall placards and poster copy for the Student Union.” 

“Excuse me, those placards get better circulation than the paper does. And that’s because no one cares about whatever the bigwigs on the board are up to, but they _do_ care about which autumnal soup is totally their vibe.” 

“I’m butternut squash,” Jack says, popping the last bit of his sandwich into his mouth, “Since you didn’t ask.” 

“Please, you’re corn chowder and you know it,” 

“Alright, touche. You heading out?” 

“Yeah, I have physio in the morning. But we’re still on for afternoon breakfast right?” 

Jack nods. “Absolutely. Um, hey, since you’re heading out and abandoning me, would you maybe...dropsomethingatcopydeskformeplease?” 

“Can’t Racetrack do it for you? Or are him and Spot off again,” Crutchie looks over his shoulder at where Race is hunched over his well-stickered laptop, a snapback on his head proclaiming _SPORTS!_ , in a way that was both ironic and accurate for someone who was the lead sports writer. 

“No, they’re on. Well. Sort of. They’re doing this new thing where they break up at like 6pm before deadline and then get back together when we go to print.” 

“That’s bizarre. Is it working?” 

“I guess,” Jack said. “And hey, that means no walking in on some dubious workplace practices in the men’s bathroom at 3 am anymore. I think it really says something about Spot that I am _more_ scared of him after having seen his dick.” 

Crutchie makes a big show of rolling his eyes, but he dutifully accepts the paper from Jack. “I don’t know why you guys are all so scared of Spot Conlon. He’s just a guy.” 

“I’m just doing _you_ a favour so you’re not woken up by your poor roommate having night terrors about Spot and his red pen of doom.” 

“Sure you are,” Crutchie says, and then leans in close, lowering his voice. “Oh hey, speaking of people who need to fuck....” 

“Who!?” Jack says, whipping around in his chair like this is fucking amateur hour.

“Davey and Katherine. Just let them get some of that, you know, intensity out of their systems.” 

“Are you fucking serious, they’d spend like an hour arguing about who should be on top and then just criticize each other’s performance the whole time.” 

“I just call ‘em like I see ‘em,” Crutchie says. “And hey, can we not do the slamming door symphony when you get home at god knows when. It’s not a sitcom.”

“Yes dearest,” Jack says, barely holding back a delighted laugh when Crutchie flips him off before swinging by the copy desk.

It’s about half an hour later when Denton finally emerges from his office, barely out the door before he’s ambushed by both Katherine and Davey. Jack can’t hear what Denton says to them but they alternate looking pleased and annoyed in equal measure, which probably means that Denton has cooked up a power nap fueled compromise that will make absolutely no one happy. 

Davey confirms as much when he flops back down in his chair with a huff, and then holds off on actually complaining for an admirable four minutes. 

“Denton said we’re running the two ads that are already paid for but we won’t run anymore going forward. Which I think it’s an arbitrary line to draw, but whatever. And he’s letting Katherine do a write-up about the exploitative practices of multi-level marketing for the next edition,” he says finally. 

“Well hey that ain’t so bad,” Jack says after a moment, spinning around in his chair, putting on a melodramatically gruff voice. “It’s a compromise we can all live with.” 

He looks up to gauge Davey’s reaction, but he’s looking down at his phone, a bemused expression on his face. 

“I don’t know why I bother,” Jack says booting up photoshop. 

“Hmm? What?” Davey says, head snapping up. 

“Oh nothing, just missing my completely hilarious and witty commentary.” 

“Yeah, that does sound like nothing,” Davey agrees. “Hey, don’t look so hurt, you set that one up.” 

“Sorry we can’t all be making mooney eyes at our phone.” 

“Uhh, okay. You wanna be the pot or the kettle this week?” 

Jack squints, “What’s that supposed to mean?” 

Davey looks at his exasperatedly, throwing a melodramatic arm over his forehead. “Oh _Crutchie_ darling dearest most dearest darling, oh _thank you_ for getting me Jimmy Johns, how can I ever repay you but in love and gratitude!” 

“Alright, fuck off,” Jack says. “Can’t a guy love and appreciate his bro without an agenda? Pretty heteronormative of you David.” 

“Yeah you know me,” Davey says, “Mister Heteronormative. Remind me, did we meet at Twink Night at the Neon Cactus or Slut Night?” 

“Definitely Slut Night,” Jack says. “Two for one porn star shots.” 

“That’s right,” Davey says, turning back to his computer. “Good times.” 

Jack zones out into the fairly mundane work of laying up the advertising spreads for a while, all the drama from earlier having evaporated into pretty much nothing. Or at least he’d thought it had evaporated into pretty much nothing, but that was probably giving Davey and Katherine more credit than they deserved. 

He’s just up at the little kitchenette to get some more water when Katherine comes over, rummaging through the cupboards for a moment before coming up empty handed and looking annoyed. “Um, hi, who took my wasabi peas?” 

“Heya, don’t look at me,” Jack says, hands help up in surrender. “You know that’s not my jive.” It was a well known fact among the paper staff that Katherine seemed to eat exclusively weird snacks, which Jack was pretty sure was just a way to make sure no one else ate them. He’d learned the very hard way that it was a bad idea to ever go halvsies with her on a pizza.

Katherine’s eyes narrow, scanning the rest of the office before, surprise, surprise, landing on; “Davey!” 

Davey looks up. “What?” 

“Did you seriously take my wasabi peas?” 

“There was no name on them— ” 

“ —Okay but everyone _knows_ they’re mine, and— ” 

“ —The rule is if there’s no name on them that they’re free for all and— ” 

“ —That’s not the point! You don’t even like them— ” 

“ —I’m literally eating them right now. So what, now you get to decide what I like—” 

“ —I have offered them to you so many times and you never want them!” 

“Hey!” Spot’s voice cuts through their little tete-a-tete, “Some of us are actually tryin’ to get some work done. Can you stuff it?” 

“Sorry Spot,” Jack says, even though he wasn’t even talking, Katherine already striding across the office. 

“Hey,” Davey protests as she pulls the bag out of his hands, a sharpie having materialized seemingly from nowhere as she scrawls ‘KATHERINE P’ onto the bag and underlines it twice, carrying it back with her to the kitchenette and shoving it into the cupboard. 

“Oh come _on_ ,” Davey says. “You’re not even going to eat them? That’s just cruel.” 

Katherine blows him a kiss over her shoulder and stalks off back to features. 

Maybe Crutchie did kind of have a point. 

Not that it was going to happen now that Davey was taken up with some mystery girl he’d met over the summer. Jack still hadn’t met her (despite a lot of not-very-subtle hinting that Davey should bring her around) but Davey was constantly texting her, and on one very special occasion had hear him talking to over the phone, cooing _alright Kitty_ , a fact which Jack held dearly even if he hadn’t brought it up for fear of what Davey would do to him. It was the kind of gross sappiness he’d never have expected from Davey, but hey, didn’t love change people? 

They make it another hour or so without incident, Katherine even swinging by Davey’s desk at one point with a bag of blue raspberry sour belts as what might have been some kind of truce. 

“I thought you didn’t really like sour stuff,” Jack says, rolling his chair over to help himself when Katherine’s gone back to features. 

“I don’t but it’s the principle of the thing,” Davey says, mouth faintly blue. 

Jack’s basically done at this point with layout, just waiting for the final okay from copy desk. Spot Conlon had a habit of declaring articles entirely unsalvageable right at the last minute, so Jack knows he’s not imagining it when everyone tenses as Spot makes his way over to Davey’s desk article in hand. 

“Oh lord,” Davey says, under his breath and Jack pulls on his headphones, even though Spot and Davey have always gotten on swimmingly especially as far as Conlon Copy Chief Conflicts go. 

Even through the buffer of his very-turned-up music he can hear Davey and Spot murmuring behind him, but he still jumps when Spot puts a hand on his shoulder. 

“Ah! What!?” Jack says way too loudly, pulling his headphones off. 

“We’ve got a gap,” Spot says. “One of David’s section articles is gonna need a complete rehaul, so we’ll run it next issue.” 

“You got any ideas for filler?” Jack says, turning in his chair to include Davey in this question. 

Davey shrugs, “Features can probably throw something together quick.” 

“That work for you?” Spot asks, arms crossed over his chest. If Jack wasn’t so scared of him he might seriously consider asking what exactly he’s been doing in the gym to get that kind of muscle definition. Maybe he can glean the details from Race if he asks nice, Racetrack has never been one to turn down an opportunity to talk about his boyfriend. 

“Yeah, sure,” Jack says. “I’ll fiddle some things around, can one of you ask Katherine what she wants to do and I can give her an idea of the space she’s got.” 

Davey and Spot share an unimpressed glance, “This is a layout issue,” Spot says flatly. 

“Uh, no it’s not it’s a ‘Davey’s reporter screwed up’ issue,” Jack says. 

“I’m too busy,” Davey says, a Buzzfeed quiz _clearly_ open on the browser behind him. 

“Just talk to her,” Spot says, and then stalks off back to copy desk. 

“It’s cute that you think me talking to her will make her less annoyed with _you_ for this being a news section screw up.” 

Davey waves a vague hand at Jack, taking another sip of his Pepsi and going back to his quiz as Jack crosses the office to where Katherine is bent over her desk. She’s in the big puffy pink cardigan she always has at the office for when she inevitably gets cold. Which was good news for all of them after Davey and Katherine’s great thermostat debacle from last semester. 

“Say, that’s a cute sweater,” Jack tries, in the vain hope that flattery might get him somewhere. 

“It was a gift,” Katherine says, not even looking up at him. “Go away, I’m working.” 

“We gotta hole in the issue,” Jack offers, jumping straight to the point. “We need something quick from features to fill the space.” 

Katherine’s entire back unbends in one quick fluid motion, “Pardon?” 

“Spot rejected one of Davey’s section articles, so— ” Jack says, but suddenly Katherine is up and striding past him, the second half of his sentence dribbling away from him as she brushes past. 

“To what do I owe the pleasure?” Davey says when Katherine lands at his desk. 

“What the hell is this I hear about _features_ needing to miraculously produce a new article at— ” she checks her watch, “1:48 am because one of _your_ articles was rejected by copy desk?” 

“It wasn’t _my_ article,” Davey says. 

“Oh gee here I was thinking you were the _section head_.” 

“Look I can’t just make up a new news story off the top of my head,” Davey says, in the tone of voice of someone who has a good point and knows it. “Just write a movie review or, I don’t know, speculate on the next Pulitzer prize winner, we’ll call it insider info.” 

“It’s just _named_ after my family. I don’t have anything to do with that!” Katherine snaps, she’s always been weirdly sensitive about being descended from one of the biggest names in the history of publishing. Jack didn’t really get it, if you had an advantage use it, but Katherine even insisted on writing under a pseudonym, as if nepotism at their rinky dink college paper meant anything more than people berating their siblings to participate in campus opinion polls so they could boost their numbers. 

“I don’t know what you want me to tell you,” Davey says. “What, you want to toss it to sports?” 

Katherine scoffs hard, gaze darting over to Racetrack’s desk, where he was throwing M&Ms into the air and catching them in his mouth. Race had a knack for managing to spin sports stories that actually sounded fresh, and was good at asking the right questions to get half decent answers out of athletes and coaches. But it still wasn’t exactly the section you wanted to turn to for a last minute burst of inspiration. 

“I just think as s _ection head_ of news you’re being irresponsible for tossing it onto me,” Katherine says instead. 

“Well when _you’re_ section head of news you can make a different call,” Davey says, and then seems to immediately regret it, wincing. 

It was no secret that Katherine had desperately wanted to be the news section head and was less than thrilled to have been appointed features head, as much as she often denied this and would scroll out a whole prepared speech on why features wasn’t just fluff. 

Still, her face goes very soft and open for a moment before she schools her mouth and eyebrows into angry flat lines. “You know what, I’m not even sure why we’re having this conversation, this seems like a layout issue to me, so I think layout can figure it out.” 

Jack makes a mostly unintentional noise somewhere between a scoff and a groan as Katherine pulls her cardigan tight around herself and turns back to her desk. 

“Dav-ey,” Jack says. 

“I know,” Davey says. 

“That was too far.” 

“I _know_ ,” he repeats more emphatically, grabbing his phone from his desk. 

“Well if you know, then can you please kiss and make up?” Jack says, “Why do all of your spats lead to me having to deal with stuff? You ever noticed that, huh?” 

Davey’s not looking, fingers flying over the touchscreen keyboard of his phone and Jack sighs, turning back to his desk and scrambling for his own phone. A few too many years out of date and the corner of the screen shattered pretty badly, but a phone’s a phone and as long as it’s ringing his call through Jack’s not going to complain. 

“You better be dead or dyin’ Jack,” Crutchie says. “It’s two in the morning.” 

“Hello to you too handsome,” Jack said. “Don’t exaggerate, it’s only 1:52.” 

“Dead or _dyin’_ Jack.” 

“Well if I don’t fill this hole in the layout, Spot Conlon will probably murder me and Race’ll help him hide the body in the morning when they’re a couple again.” 

Crutchie sighs. “What, features can’t just crank something out?” 

“You’d think, but Jacobs and Plumber-Pulitzer have their own ideas.” 

Crutchie sighs, “I can send you that autumnal soup quiz.” 

“You are a gentleman and a scholar.” 

“Yeah, yeah, tell me in the morning,” Crutchie says, and then hangs up, Jack getting the email with the quiz attached just a few minutes later. It’s a bitch to reformat, but it’s worth it to not have to get in between another Katherine and Davey snit or face the wrath of Conlon. 

It’s coming up on three when Denton announces they’re wrapped for the issue, and Jack’s so focused on getting home and into his very cozy and warm bed as quickly as possible ( _“And quietly!”_ Crutchie’s voice in his mind reminds him) that he makes it all the way down the block before he realizes he’s forgotten his jacket on the back of his chair. 

“Shiiiit,” he says to no one, turning back on his heel and digging the key fob for the building out of his jeans pocket. He’d already been one of the last people out, so he’s not surprised when he doesn’t see anyone on his way back up to the offices. There’s a light still on though, and Jack can hear the distinctive back and forth of Davey and Katherine’s voices, groaning a little to himself internally. 

It was frankly almost impressive that they had the energy to keep this up at 3:00 am, but even still, Jack creeps just into the threshold of the office, not spotting Katherine and Davey at first because they’re over by her desk in the far corner. 

“I just think it’s unprofessional,” Katherine is saying, gathering up a handful of pens. 

“He doesn’t do a bad job though,” Davey says, and Katherine tosses him a withering little look over her shoulder. 

“Right but isn’t being professional _part_ of the job— ” 

“ —Well sure, but— ” 

“ —It doesn’t need to be all compromises and kumbaya,” Katherine says, aggressively zipping up her laptop case. 

“When has it ever been like that?” Davey says, leaning against her desk. 

“I would so much rather just have someone tell me no than come up with a wishy washy compromise, that’s all I’m saying.” 

“Oh so that’s one of my many fine qualities that you like?” Davey says, and Jack freezes, expecting something cutting from Katherine, but instead she _laughs_ and not even condescendingly like, actually laughs. 

“One of them, sure,” she agrees. 

Crisis averted, Jack figures he should be good to duck in quick, grab his jacket and bolt. 

“Anyways,” she says, “I just hope whoever is EIC next year will be a little more willing to make some firm decisions.” 

Davey scoffs and Jack freezes again, only a step into the offices, still about ten feet away from his desk. “Okay come off it.” 

“What?” 

“Oh like you don’t know.” 

“Obviously I don’t, why would I be asking if I didn’t?” Katherine says, irritation just starting to rise in her voice. 

“We _all_ know you’re gonna be Editor-in-Chief next year.” 

“Hmm, alright,” Katherine says. 

Despite doing his absolute best to avoid being drawn into this conversation at all, Jack can’t help but nod to himself. It is true that there’s really no other candidate who could possibly take over for Denton other than her. Especially now, because Davey wouldn’t want to budge from news, but even if he would have, she was still the obvious candidate. 

“You don’t have to be humble about it, it’s practically a known fact,” Davey says pulling on the bottom of her pink cardigan. Jack creeping another few feet closer to his desk. 

“Well don’t say _that,_ ” Katherine says, voice laced with annoyance. 

“Why not?” 

“Because,” Katherine says, “It’s no fun when you _let_ me win.” 

“Is that so?” Davey says. 

“You know me,” she says, in a tone of voice Jack has never heard her use before, simultaneously dangerous and coy, and it stuns him so much he stops right in his tracks, “I like to work for what I get.” 

And then. 

It’s truly a blink and you’ll miss it kind of moment. One second Katherine and Davey are a respectable co-workerly three or four feet apart and the next several things are being dropped or shoved aside and they’re kissing like two kids at welcome week who just got dumped by their high school sweethearts and want to make up for lost time. 

Katherine has Davey’s face in both of her hands and Davey is pulling her cardigan off in these awkward frantic pulls before Katherine breaks away and pulls it off herself and then starts going for the buttons on Davey’s shirt. 

Jack darts a longing glance at his jacket still several feet away on the back of his chair, hears Davey swear loudly and the sound of what might be a belt buckle hitting a metal desk, and when he looks up again there’s a lot of hands in a lot of places. Davey is pulling Katherine up onto her desk and more things are going sprawling and Jack really really needs to _go_. 

He’s out the building and several blocks away, half in shock and half musing on how smug Crutchie is going to be that he was right before it hits him. 

Davey has a girlfriend. 

A probably nice probably very normal girlfriend who, yes he still had in his phone as ‘Cute girl from Practicum,’ but who didn’t deserve to get cheated on. Especially not with Davey’s newspaper nemesis. 

Which is all very upsetting and convoluted. 

But also it’s so late that it’s practically early and Jack has already wasted so much time tonight thinking about Davey and Katherine’s drama, so he just decides all of this is a problem for future him and picks up the pace so he can get home (and in bed) as soon as possible. 

Crutchie’s at physio when Jack finally wakes up a cool seven minutes after noon, which gives him a little under an hour to get up, showered, dressed, and over to the Sheepshead’s for afternoon breakfast. 

Jack spots Crutchie tucked in a booth, past the hordes of hungover (or still drunk) college kids that clustered at the counter. 

“Afternoon,” Crutchie says, not looking up from his menu as Jack slides into the booth. 

“Afternoon,” Jack agrees with a grin. “How was physio?” 

“Same old, how was work? Did the soup quiz avoid a further Davey and Kath blowup?” 

It’s a really unfortunate choice that Jack had chosen that moment to take a sip of his water, spluttering all over himself as what he’d seen at the office comes rushing back. 

“You’re not supposed to inhale it,” Crutchie says, shoving a wad of napkins at Jack who accepts them and tries to halfheartedly dab at his now damp shirt. 

“Davey and Katherine,” Jack croaks out, when he can talk. “They’re. They. In the office.” 

“Come again?” 

Jack takes another sip of water and manges to get it down the right pipes this time. “I saw Katherine and Davey like,” he makes a wild hand gesture that he hopes conveys the vague sense of whatever they were planning to get up to on that desk. “In the office.” 

Crutchie flicks his laminated menu like a businessman brandishing a copy of the Times. “Well, well, well, sounds like I had my finger right on the pulse.” 

“Okay well don’t buy a banner yet,” Jack says, pressing the heels of his hands into his forehead, “Because Davey has a girlfriend.” 

Crutchie squints. “Since when?” 

“The summer I think?” 

“Well maybe they have an open relationship or something? Davey really doesn’t strike me as the kind of guy who’d be cheating on someone.” 

“They definitely don’t have an open relationship,” Spot Conlon says from directly behind him, and Jack jumps a whole six inches in the air, turning to see Spot and Racetrack on the same side of the booth directly behind them. 

“Jesus!” Jack says. “Are you followin’ me?” 

“Yeah I asked him about it in the summer,” Spot says, entirely ignoring Jack, which is about par for the course, “Which is too bad. He’s really the one that got away.” 

Crutchie tilts his head, “I thought I was the one who got away.” 

“Nah you were the best I ever had.” 

Racetrack smacks his boyfriend, “Tied for first, obviously,” Spot corrects. 

“Thank ya kindly,” Race says, seemingly satisfied. 

“That’s gotta be unsanitary,” Crutchie muses, “In the office like that.” 

“It’s not too bad if you stay mostly clothed,” Racetrack says, shoveling pancakes into his mouth. 

“Yeah, and just wipe down everything after,” Spot says. “It’s not a big deal.” 

“Oh _god_ ,” Jack says. 

“Well hey, next time you need a pinch hint for features you can do a write up about what the black light uncovered in the newspaper offices,” Crutchie offers. 

Jack shudders and turns back around, ignoring Spot and Racetrack who look about thirty seconds away from reliving some sort of sordid semi-public tryst in the middle of a diner. 

“I mean hey, maybe Davey and his girlfriend broke up,” Crutchie offers once their orders are in. 

“Maybe,” Jack says, even though he doubts if Davey’s many bouts of texting mooney eyes were anything to go on. “I mean what’s my moral imperative here? If he was cheating?”

“Uh, nothing. Do you even know who his girlfriend _is_?” 

“Well no but. Doesn’t that feel wrong to just not say anything? Ethically?” 

Crutchie gives him a long look that lands somewhere on the unique spectrum of exasperated and endeared. “See, I knew that philosophy elective last semester was a bad idea. You’re so impressionable.” 

Jack flicks his crumpled up straw wrapper at Crutchie, and when he laughs it melts away some of the weird tension he’d been holding in his chest. It sucks but Crutchie was right, if Davey and Katherine wanted to hook up, with or without the blessing of Davey’s girlfriend, it wasn’t really any of his business at all. 

Still, that doesn’t stop the dread that wells up in his stomach when Crutchie’s up at the register paying (after their usual practiced argument about who should pay, in which Jack will give in to him and then slip him the money later) and his phone lights up with a new text from Davey. 

_Hey! You forgot your jacket at the office_

_I grabbed it for you so swing by whenever_

The not insubstantial amount of breakfast food Jack consumed in the last hour threatens to make a reappearance as Crutchie comes back to the table, the clicking sounds of his crutches genuinely soothing. 

“What’s wrong?” 

“Nothing.” 

“Really? Cause you look like you’re gonna hurl.” 

“Davey has my jacket.” 

“I see.” 

“He wants me to swing by his place and pick it up.” 

“Uh-huh,” Crutchie says. 

“Well what the hell am I supposed to do?” Jack says. 

Crutchie’s eyebrows scrunch. “You go to his place, you get your jacket, you don’t say shit, and then you leave.” 

“But— ” 

“Eh, no buts,” Crutchie says. “Or look I can go for you.” 

“I’ll go,” Jack says. “I just. I know it sounds crazy but I don’t think Davey would cheat on his girlfriend. There must be something else going on.” 

“You’re a good person Jack Kelly. Not always the smartest, sure, but always good,” Crutchie reaches out and pulls on the collar of Jack’s shirt, something just out of reach pinging in Jack’s brain from the action. “But that doesn’t mean you gotta go sticking your nose in other people’s business.” 

“I guess you’re right.” 

“I’m always right.” 

“Yes dearest,” Jack says sincerely. 

He’s almost halfway to Davey’s apartment when he realizes that Crutchie pulled on his collar exactly the same way Davey pulled on Katherine’s cardigan. 

“Hey,” Davey says, pulling open the door of his apartment. “C’mon in, I got your stuff.” 

It’s far from the first time he’s seen Davey outside of classes and work, but it’s so odd to see him barefoot in sweatpants and one of the newspaper t-shirts from last year (“Filling Recycling Bins since 1899!” emblazoned on the back proudly). 

Davey’s apartment is small but exceptionally tidy, which is maybe why Katherine’s pink cardigan draped over the back of a chair in what can only very graciously be called a living room immediately catches Jack’s eye. 

“Let me just grab your jacket,” Davey is saying, but Jack’s not really paying attention, a weird whooshing sound in his ears. Davey turns into a room off the hallway and Jack distantly hears him talking to someone, a soft feminine sounding voice, lilting and happy. 

Jack had promised he wasn’t going to say anything, but it was one thing for Davey to have an indiscretion in a moment of weakness at the office. After all emotions always ran high at the paper, especially right before deadline. But it was quite another thing to bring evidence home and rub it in the face of some poor unsuspecting Cute Girl from Practicum. 

“And here we go,” Davey says, re-emerging with Jack’s jacket in hand. “How did you even leave without this, it was cold last night.” 

“Is your girlfriend here?” Jack says.

“Um, yeah?” Davey says, still holding out the jacket anticipatorily. 

“That’s Katherine’s sweater,” Jack says, and he can practically feel the phantom pain from where Crutchie would be whacking him in the shin if he were here right now, but he’s not so Jack just pushes on ahead. 

“Uh, _yes_ ,” Davey says. 

Jack laughs humourlessly, “Seriously dude?” 

“Seriously dude, what?” Davey prompts, like Jack is the one being crazy here. 

“You brought _Katherine’s sweater_ back to your apartment!?” 

“I mean she brought it herself,” Davey says. “Do you want your jacket? What is happening here?” 

“You can’t just— !” Jack splutters, all the words scrambling up inside him like scrubbed colour from paint brushes mixing as it swirls down the drain. “I saw you last night! You and her on the— at the office Dave!” 

“Oh shit,” Davey says, the arm that was holding out Jack’s jacket flopping limply to his side. 

“Yeah. Shit.” 

“I’m really sorry you had to see that,” Davey says, rubbing at the back of his neck, “Look, can you maybe...keep this quiet? I promise that is not— it was totally a fluke. We were both just really wound up, it won’t happen again.” 

“Yeah well maybe you should have thought about that before you brought back _evidence_ to your apartment to rub in the face of your poor unsuspecting girlfriend!” 

“Wait, what?” Davey says, squinting at Jack, but he’s not done. 

“You know I may not know this girl, because you haven’t introduced us even though we’re friends, and maybe it’s not that serious if her name in your phone is still Cute Girl from Practicum, but still! She doesn’t deserve to get _cheated_ on! What is wrong with you Dave!” 

He’s not exactly aiming to stun Davey speechless, but it’s not exactly an unwelcome outcome, Davey flapping his mouth open and shut uselessly a few times before finally managing out, “Did Katherine put you up to this?” 

“What?” Jack says, because apparently now it’s his turn to be caught off guard. 

“Seriously, if she did you have to tell me.” 

“No why would she? In what world would Katherine put me up to this.” 

“Shit,” Davey says, more to himself than Jack, and then turns and calls over his shoulder, “Hey Kitty, can you come here for a second?” 

Oh shit maybe this is like a weird open relationship thing after all. Maybe Jack is being painfully monogo-normative or whatever. Maybe Davey just didn’t wanna hook up with Spot, and who could blame him? Jack didn’t trust anyone who was that short but that jacked. 

But Jack doesn’t have any longer to dwell on the perils of polyamory or Spot’s leg day routine, because suddenly Katherine’s upper body is leaning out of Davey’s bedroom doorway. “Why, what’s up?” she says to Davey, and then, spotting Jack, “Oh hey, Jack.” 

“Kerhm?” Jack hears himself say involuntarily as Davey grabs his wallet off a side table and pulls out a handful of bills. 

“Okay I only have like twelve bucks in cash right now, but I’m good for the other three,” Davey says, waving them at Katherine who’s padding down the narrow hallway to meet him, slipping easily under Davey’s arm and pressing herself up against his side. 

“I mean I will take the money, but what’s this for?” Katherine says. 

“You were right, Jack didn’t know we were dating,” Davey says. 

“The fuck!?” Jack splutters. 

“He thought I was cheating on you,” Davey says. “With you.” 

“Oh Jack, come _on_ ,” Katherine says. “That’s disappointing.” 

“Ehhh, you did just make fifteen bucks off him,” Davey points out. 

“I know but I’m not thrilled about it,” Katherine says, rubbing at the front of Davey’s shirt like she’s trying to gently erase the text. He looks at her in this soft fond melty way, pressing a kiss into the side of her head. 

None of this is helping Jack’s crisis. 

“I’m— ” Jack says. “You said it was a fluke!” 

“Yes. Us hooking up. In the office. Was a fluke,” Davey says, chopping up the sentence the same way you cut up food into small pieces for a small child. 

“I mean does that _really_ count as hooking up?” Katherine says. “It was just oral.” 

“Hrgh!” Jack protests. “I don’t need the details.”

“Calm down, you think Spot and Racetrack haven’t done worse at the offices? You’ve _seen_ them do worse,” Katherine sniffs. 

“But— ” Jack says, trying to find a nicer way to phrase ‘but you hate each other,’ and coming up empty. 

“But?” Katherine prompts, and her and Davey share this little private bemused look and Jack realizes in that moment he’s never, _ever_ , going to live this down. 

“Crutchie didn’t know either!” he settles on finally, if you can’t beat ‘em, bring your best

friend down with you. 

“Crutchie hasn’t worked on the paper since before we got together, that's totally

reasonable,” Davey shrugs. 

“Spot and Race didn’t know!”

Davey perks up at that as Katherine groans and hands him back the cash he’d just given

her. “You good for the other three dollars?” 

“No but I’ll make it up to you,” Katherine says leaning up and kissing him on the jaw. “Nice to see you Jack, but I have a paper on digital redlining to beat into submission.” She leans over and grabs her pink cardigan from the chair and fluttering back down the hall. 

“She really lets you call her Kitty?” Jack says, because the rest of his brain is still rebooting. 

“It’s like a family thing.” 

“Well hey ain’t the paper kinda like a family? Think I could get in on that?” 

“Try it and I’ll rip your tongue out!” Katherine calls over her shoulder. 

Alright can’t blame a guy for trying. 

“Can I have my jacket please,” Jack says, still feeling a bit dazed. 

“Yeah, yeah,” Davey hands it over and then frowns, head tilting to the side. “I really

thought you knew. I thought you were, I don’t know, just being funny with the whole ‘oh Davey when are you going to bring your girlfriend around thing.’” 

Jack shoves his arms into his jacket even though it’s pretty warm and sunny outside, more just to have something to do and a place to put his hands. “That’s me, barrel of laughs.” 

“But then again,” Davey says musingly, “Maybe I shouldn’t be surprised that you’re not always right on top of, lets say, um, romantic signals?” 

Jack squints at him, “And what is that supposed to mean?” 

“Nothing,” Davey says, ushering Jack towards the door. “But when you _do_ figure it out let me know and we can plan a double date.” 

“What does that mean” Jack says fruitlessly, mostly to Davey’s apartment door, which is probably about as forthcoming with an answer as Davey would be. 

Crutchie, to his credit, listens very very patiently as Jack paces up and down the length of their apartment as he recounts the entire story. He makes a few alterations which lean away from his prying, but Crutchie makes an unimpressed little face which implies he knows Jack’s twisting the truth a little. 

“Wow,” Crutchie says, when Jack finally stops pacing and collapses onto the couch beside him. 

“It’s crazy right?” 

“And you _really_ didn’t know?” Crutchie asks. “You never suspected?” 

“You didn’t know either!” Jack snaps, and then feels bad Crutchie holding up his hands in surrender. 

“You don’t have to get all defensive, I was just askin’.” 

“Sorry. And no, I didn’t. I just thought they were— just Davey and Katherine, competitive, combative...something else that begins with a c?” 

“I knew it was sexual tension,” Crutchie says. “I just didn’t know it wasn’t unresolved.” 

“Yeah no I think it’s _very_ resolved.” 

Crutchie laughs and tips his head back on the top of the couch and then tilts it over towards Jack. “Maybe I shouldn’t have ditched to write copy for the student union, the paper is way more exciting clearly.” 

“Apparently,” Jack says, and sighs. “I still can’t believe I didn’t know. Like I knew Race and Spot were fucking _way_ before the bathroom incident.” 

“I mean, _sure_ ,” Crutchie says, his accent drawing it out in a way that hits Jack square in the chest, _Shoryuh_. “But they weren’t exactly subtle.” 

“No, but I’m also very good at that kind of interpersonal observance.”

Crutchie sits up at that, “You think so?” 

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Jack huffs. 

Crutchie blinks at him for a second and then waves a vague hand over his whole body, like that is supposed to clear anything up. 

“What’s this?” Jack says, he mirrors Crutchie waving a hand over himself. “What is this?” 

“Oh for cryin’ out loud,” Crutchie says, and leans forward, grabbing Jack one handed under the chin, and pulling him forward to kiss him square on the mouth. 

“Oh!” Jack says, mostly into Crutchie’s mouth, and then kind of melts into the kiss like a punctured bike tire slowly losing air. It’s a good thing Crutchie’s got him under the jaw because it feels like about eighty-percent of why he’s still managed to stay upright. It takes a minute, but Jack finally remembers he has arms and hands, pulling Crutchie forward a little bit by the back of his neck. 

When Crutchie finally pulls away from the kiss he doesn’t really go anywhere, pushing Jack’s fringe off his forehead. 

And hey, if Jack’s time at the paper had taught him anything, just because something wasn’t a breaking story didn’t mean it wasn’t a story worth covering. 

“You still wanna tell me you’re good at interpersonal observances?” 

“Well that’s what I have you for, right?” Jack says, still a little bit melted. 

“Among other things,” Crutchie says and kisses him again. 

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you so much to evol_love, youshallnotfinditso, and Molly for all your contributions to this fic, including some very inside baseball college newspaper stories. You can find me on tumblr where I'm also phonecallfromgod.


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